When you have taken the upper hand, then it will be good.
Life, dear Foma, is very simple: either bite everybody, or lie in the gutter." The old man smiled, and the broken teeth in his mouth roused in Foma the keen thought: "You have bitten many, it seems." "There's but one word--battle!" repeated the old man.
"Is this the real one ?" asked Foma, looking at Mayakin searchingly.
"That is, what do you mean--the real ?" "Is there nothing better than this?
Does this contain everything ?" "Where else should it be?
Everybody lives for himself.

Each of us wishes the best for himself.

And what is the best?
To go in front of others, to stand above them.

So that everybody is trying to attain the first place in life--one by this means, another by that means.

But everyone is positively anxious to be seen from afar, like a tower.